Commissioner's Statement on the Employment Situation News Release

Advance copies of this statement are made available to the press
under lock-up conditions with the explicit understanding that the
data are embargoed until 8:30 a.m. Eastern Standard Time.
Statement of
William J. Wiatrowski
Acting Commissioner
Bureau of Labor Statistics
Friday, March 9, 2018
Nonfarm payroll employment increased by 313,000 in
February, and the unemployment rate was unchanged at 4.1
percent. Job gains occurred in construction, retail trade,
professional and business services, manufacturing, financial
activities, and mining.
Incorporating revisions for December and January, which
increased nonfarm payroll employment by 54,000, monthly job
gains have averaged 242,000 over the past 3 months.
Construction employment increased by 61,000 in February and
has grown by 185,000 over the past 4 months. Job growth in
February occurred among specialty trade contractors (+38,000)
and in construction of buildings (+16,000), with these increases
split about evenly between the residential and nonresidential
components.
In February, retail trade employment rose by 50,000. Within
the industry, employment increased in general merchandise stores
(+18,000) and clothing stores (+15,000). On a not seasonally
adjusted basis, these industries hired fewer workers than usual
for the holidays and did not shed as many jobs as usual after
the holiday season. As a result, employment rose in these
industries in February, after seasonal adjustment. However, over
the past 4 months, which traditionally see the bulk of the
holiday hiring and layoff, employment in these industries has
changed little on net. Elsewhere in retail trade, building
material and garden supply stores added jobs over the month
(+10,000).
Employment in professional and business services increased
by 50,000 in February and has risen by 495,000 over the year.
Within the industry, employment in temporary help services edged
up over the month (+27,000).
Manufacturing employment grew by 31,000 in February. The
industry has added 224,000 jobs over the past 12 months. In
February, transportation equipment (+8,000), fabricated metal
products (+6,000), machinery (+6,000), and primary metals
(+4,000) added jobs.
Employment in financial activities rose by 28,000 over the
month. Job growth occurred in credit intermediation (+8,000);
insurance carriers (+8,000); and in securities, commodity
contracts, and investments (+5,000). Over the year, financial
activities has added 143,000 jobs.
In February, mining employment rose by 9,000, with most of
the job gain occurring in support activities for mining
(+7,000). Since a recent low point in October 2016, mining has
added 69,000 jobs.
Employment in health care continued to trend up over the
month (+19,000) and has expanded by 290,000 over the year.
Within the industry, hospitals added 9,000 jobs in February.
Employment in other major industries--including wholesale
trade, transportation and warehousing, information, leisure and
hospitality, and government--changed little over the month.
Average hourly earnings of all employees on private nonfarm
payrolls rose by 4 cents in February to $26.75, following a
7-cent gain in January. Over the past 12 months, average hourly
earnings have risen by 2.6 percent. From January 2017 to January
2018, the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U)
increased by 2.1 percent (on a seasonally adjusted basis).
Turning now to measures from the survey of households, the
unemployment rate in February was 4.1 percent for the fifth
month in a row. The number of unemployed people, at 6.7 million,
was essentially unchanged in February.
There was also little movement in the number of unemployed
people who had been looking for work for 27 weeks or more. In
February, there were 1.4 million such individuals, accounting
for 20.7 percent of the unemployed.
The labor force rose by 806,000 in February, and the labor
force participation rate increased by 0.3 percentage point to
63.0 percent. Total employment, as measured by the household
survey, rose by 785,000, and the employment-population ratio
increased by 0.3 percentage point to 60.4 percent.
Among the employed, the number of people working part time
for economic reasons, also referred to as involuntary part-time
workers, was little changed at 5.2 million in February.
Among those neither working nor looking for work in
February, 1.6 million were marginally attached to the labor
force, little different from a year earlier. Discouraged
workers, a subset of the marginally attached who believed that
no jobs were available to them, numbered 373,000 in February,
down by 149,000 from a year earlier. (People who are marginally
attached to the labor force had not looked for work in the 4
weeks prior to the survey but wanted a job, were available for
work, and had looked for a job within the last 12 months.)
In summary, nonfarm payroll employment increased by 313,000
in February, and the unemployment rate held steady at 4.1
percent.